Glamour Magazine’s latest issue was meant to be a positive stride towards accepting all shapes and sizes in fashion. With plus size model Ashley Graham on their cover, Glamour went ahead and listed 4 other names of “women who inspire us”: Melissa McCarthy, Adele, Ashley Graham and Amy Schumer.
Amy Schumer posted the cover picture on her Instagram and said “ I think there’s nothing wrong with being plus size. Beautiful healthy women. Plus size is considered size 16 in America. I go between a size 6 and an 8. @glamourmag put me in their plus size only issue without asking or letting me know and it doesn’t feel right to me. Young girls seeing my body type thinking that is plus size? What are your thoughts? Mine are not cool glamour, not glamourous.” Glamour Magazine’s editor responded, saying that they had nothing but respect for Schumer and that the magazine never called her plus size.
Schumer received criticism from others, claiming that she felt ashamed for being called plus size and that it went against her established I-do-what-I-want attitude. She later went on Jimmy Fallon to explain why she decided to bring the issue up, saying “We don’t need labels. We don’t need them. It should just say what size you are, right? Why?”
Around the same time, Erin Heatherton, a former Victoria’s Secret model, talked about body image issues she has faced in an interview she gave to Time; “My last two Victoria’s Secret shows, I was told I had to lose weight,” she says. “I look back like, ‘Really?’” She later added, “And I got to a point where one night I got home from a workout and I remember staring at my food and thinking maybe I should just not eat.”
Labels have always been an issue in fashion and it doesn’t seem like they’ll be going away anytime soon. One of the people taking issue with categorizing and labeling models as plus size has been Ashley Graham, who has been featured in numerous magazines caving the pathway for other plus size models as well.
The real question and perhaps the most difficult one to answer is our everlasting, obsessive desire to categorize everything and anything. A “medium sized” women, Amy Schumer, is categorized as plus size; she didn’t really fit in anywhere, so she was put in the plus size category.
All labels and #plussizeandproud hashtags aside, what we should be focusing on is the “proud” part. Whether you like them or not, both Amy Schumer and Ashley Graham have successfully launched their careers by being themselves and relentlessly pushing through criticisms from people saying they didn’t “look” the part, and that’s what we should all be #proud of.
Cover image obtained from:
http://wwd.com/media-news/fashion-memopad/glamour-plus-size-market-lane-…
Sources obtained from:
http://www.cnn.com/2016/04/05/entertainment/amy-schumer-glamour-body-sha…
https://www.instagram.com/p/BD0sVf9KUCy/?taken-by=amyschumer
http://www.usmagazine.com/celebrity-body/news/amy-schumer-knocks-glamour…
http://www.vogue.co.uk/news/2016/03/14/erin-heatherton-on-body-image-vic…
http://www.refinery29.com/2016/04/108418/medium-size-women-body-positivi…